


Burn It to the Ground

by Kono_Rohan_Da



Series: Rohan's Whumptober 2020 [7]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Burning, Day 7, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fire, Friendship, Hospitalization, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Matter of Life and Death, Miya Atsumu Whump, Post-Canon, Pro Volleyball Player Miya Atsumu, Pro Volleyball Player Sawamura Daichi, Protective Miya Atsumu, Protective Sawamura Daichi, Rarepair, References to Depression, Rescue, Sawamura Daichi Whump, Slow Burn, Whump, Whumptober 2020, burning building, i've got you, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:02:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26867839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kono_Rohan_Da/pseuds/Kono_Rohan_Da
Summary: Sawamura DaichiAtsumu thinks, looking at one of the newest members of the EJP Raijin from across the net.Just who the hell is he?Well, good for him- he doesn't have to wait long because a convenient gas station explosion causes his hotel to catch fire. Trapped on the third floor with no way out, Atsumu doesn't really think he'll be able to make it out alive. But then the man he was just cursing the existence of turns out to be more than he expected.Whumptober | Day 7 | I've Got You. . .
Relationships: Miya Atsumu & Miya Osamu, Miya Atsumu/Sawamura Daichi, Oikawa Tooru & Sawamura Daichi
Series: Rohan's Whumptober 2020 [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948426
Comments: 5
Kudos: 76





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hippity hoppity, rarepairs are now my property. First there was UshiDai, then there was UshiIwa, then there was KuroDai and now *drumroll*.........AtsuDai. If you’ve never heard of that pair that only has 2 fanfics on AO3 as of writing this AN, it’s Atsumu x Daichi.

Volleyball. 

That’s the reason he’s here. 

Volleyball is life, as Hinata and Bokuto like to yell. 

Volleyball also happens to be the reason that he’s about to be burned into a crisp, throat closing in, eyes stinging, coughs ripping out of his mouth and through the gaps of his fingers as he stumbles out of the hotel room bed, trying to breathe and see through the haze of smoke, somehow managing to stuff his feet into a pair of slippers. . 

They were in Hiroshima after a visiting game against the EJP Raijin. The team had recently gotten a new member, a Sawamura Daichi, which had gotten Hinata and Bokuto very excited for some reason upon hearing the name. Atsumu had frowned then, not knowing why the name sounded a little familiar, the threads of a memory, of remembrance, just out of reach in his mind, like a word carefully balanced on the tip of one’s tongue, only to be lost to the depths of time. 

Of course, after the announcement and his teammates being unnaturally excited about an opposition team’s newest member, he  _ had  _ to go and look up this “Daichi-san”. Maybe he was like this Oikawa he heard about from Hinata when regaling his tales of Brazil, he had thought with disgust. Another setter who wasn’t good enough for Japan so they decided to take their mediocre skill to another country, leaving friends and family and their nation behind just for the sake of pride. 

Sawamura Daichi. Opposite hitter.  _ Former policeman _ , he thought, amused. Officer Sawamura- he could use that potentially rile the man up on the court. He wasn’t that old, only a year older than himself. He scrolls through the small bio the Raijin have on their new member. Born on the last day of December, quite fond of food, was captain of his high school volleyball team-

Captain. 

_ That  _ captain. 

Now Atsumu remembered him. No wonder Hinata had been so excited. He’d have to ask how Bokuto knows him though. 

Sawamura Daichi, captain of the misfit murder of Karasuno crows. He was one of the shorter players on his team, really good at defense. And it’s not like the Raijin needed more good defensive players. They got Suna, they got Motoya, they got Fukurodani’s Washio. Now they’ve got goddamn Sawamura Daichi, the captain who couldn’t stay on the sidelines but still manages to be an awesome defensive and offensive player.  _ Don’t forget he won Kita-san’s respect _ , his mind had told him, bringing up old memories. 

Plain and simple, he had thought back then. He hadn’t been on the same level as Tobio-kun, but apparently he was no longer plain and simple. He got on a Division 1 team after being a police officer! He doubted the governments dogs had much time to do trivial things like play volleyball. He wondered why the man had decided to play volleyball again rather than continue as an officer. Perhaps he became corrupt? Accepted bribes? Was bad at it? He had schemed a multitude of possibilities about the man, asking Sakusa what he thought of some of them. The other simply wrinkled his nose behind his mask and told him, he quote: “Get away from me.”

And then the game itself had happened. 

Before it had started, Bokuto and Hinata had rushed off to a breakfast meet with Sawamura. They came back happier than they had been when they left. This had, for some reason,  _ annoyed  _ Atsumu. He’d frowned at the image he had pulled up of Sawamura on one of his phone’s tabs. 

In person, Sawamura was much different. 

He was shorter than Atsumu, somewhere between his and Hinata’s height. His hair wasn’t as long as it was in the photo, cropped to the length Atsumu had remembered from his loss at Nationals in his second year. His face looked ageless, the same it had been years ago, with large brown eyes, mature but soft looking face.  _ He resembles a baby cow _ was the best insult Atsumu had come up with while looking at the man from across the net. Nice thighs ( _ no _ ), developed muscles probably from his previous job. 

_ Baby cow _ , he reminded himself, and tried to put as much spite as he could into the thought.  _ He’s a baby cow and a corrupt ex-officer _ . 

The Black Jackals lost their third game of the season; The EJP Raijin won. Sawamura, it had turned out, was no longer a plain and simple player anymore- it was clear that even without professional aid, he had somehow improved enough to hop onto a Division 1 team. And throughout the whole match, where Washio and Suna had always looked serious, Sawamura was like Motoya: excitement clearly sparkling in their eyes, a quick grin appearing when needed, hyping up his teammates just with a few words. It was funny that Sawamura was shorter than his teams libero. It wasn’t funny that he managed to spike a few balls past Atsumu’s own larger, more skilled hands. 

This man  _ irritated  _ him. 

Which brings him back to the present. The hotel he is in is  _ burning _ . He hears his phone rining through the cackling of the fire and wood. He follows the noise because he can’t even see the  _ door  _ with the ash and smoke and whatever else fire creates when it’s burning a hotel down. How’s he supposed to know what to do in a burning building? Look it up on his phone!? Well, excuse him, but he’s going to his phone right now and he wants to waste his time finding it and getting the hell out of here instead of looking up what to do in a burning building. 

“Wh-who is it?” He manages.

“Tsumu, you dumbass!” Osamu’s voice comes from the other end. “Yer out of the hotel, right? Where are yah?”

“Aha, funny story-” Atsumu starts before he cuts himself off with a coughing fit. He hears his brother call his voice out again. “Shut yer trap, Samu. I’m still kickin’.”

“What the hell are ya doin’ in there still? I know yer a deep sleeper, but not enough to sleep through a fire!”

“Well, excuse me” Atsumu scoffs, stumbling to the door. He has enough sense to cover his hand with the bottom part of his night shirt before touching the lock and the doorknob. Even then, he barely can because of how hot the fire has become. How long has he been in here? The fear truly hits him when he opens the door and instead of a few licks of fire and a hell lot of smoke, the whole hallway has turned red and blavk with the glow of fire and the sheer amount of smoke. He gasps and flinches away from a sudden flare of flame. 

“ATSUMU” Osamu yells. 

“I’m fine, I’m fine!” Atsumu yells back, eyes watering, fighting against the want to just squeeze them shut. There’s debris in the hallway: pieces of ceiling, open doors, doors on the ground from the heat melting the hinges or at least the screws. “Where’s everyone else?”

“The rest of yer team’s already here” Osamu says. “Now get yerself out. What floor are yah on?”

“Three” he replies, letting out a yelp when he feels his ankle burning, kicking with his other foot to brush away the small lick of flame that decided to cling to him. Now to keep his slippers from burning and frying his feet... “Are yah seriously? My luck’s  _ that bad _ ?” He tries to lighten the mood because he really isn’t in the mood of thinking of or participating in the action of death, thank you very much but no. 

The fire is everywhere. Red here, red there. With horror, he trips over a body, eyes widening with horror when he sees that it’s a woman, half trapped under a door, body badly burnt and still burning. She isn’t moving or making a sound. 

She’s dead. Just like him if he doesn’t make it out. 

The smoke stings his lungs, his throat. He’s always disliked smoking but he now swears to never touch a cigarette. Licks of fire reach out for his skin, blisters tracing themselves across his skin, trying to lur him in with the same promise they gave to that woman. He wipes the back of his hand across his forehead. This is worse than a sauna. No more saunas too. Saunas and cigarettes and dead bodies- what else does he need to add to his no-no list?

“Go to the stairs” Osamu tells him. 

“I  _ know _ ” Atsumu says, gritting his teeth. His legs are starting to feel a bit weak and he almost pisses himself when a flaming something drops from the ceiling and it’s only thanks to his left arm coming up at just the right moment that his head and hair doesn’t become a burning crisp. But the skin of his arm does get pretty badly burnt, so that’s not goof. 

Tight when Atsumu thinks he’s made it to the stairs, to  _ freedom and safety _ , he turns only to come face to face not with the two plush chairs stationed in front of the elevator and doorway to the stairs, right next to the little niche for a vending machine, but instead a window, the left and right having two doors, both of them open but not burned. The fire hadn’t reached there yet, miraculously. But a look around confirms it’s going to make it soon. 

The numbers on the wall next to both of the doors label them as numbers larger than his own door. He had a fifty-fifty chance and he went and screwed that up too. 

“Are yah kidding me?” He nearly cries. 

“Why? What?” Osamu demand. He can also hear others talking and Osamu yelling at them to shut up before talking into the phone again. “What happened?” 

“I walked the wrong way” Atsumu says, voice wavering, fighting to keep the coughing fit from coming and scaring his brother even more. He may be an asshole but he’s not that big of an asshole. “The stupid staircase, it’s in the other direction.” Osamu is quiet for a full five seconds on the other end. Atsumu would of thought, if not for Hinata’s high-pitched yelling. “Samu?”

“YOU IDIOT!” Osamu yells and Atsumu thinks that he heard a sob in that too. He’s sure he heard a voice crack. It would be embarrassing in any other situation but Osamu is his twin, and Atsumu is his. They share the same DNA. They share the same blood. At one time, they were mirrors of each other, sharing the same interests, sharing the same hopes, sharing the same dreams. He loves his brother more than he loves his own parents, more than he loves volleyball, he also admits. “Wait- what are yah saying?” Osamu asks someone else. “O-okay. Tsumu, yer at the end of the hall, yah said? What’s the room on yer left?”

“322” He answers. “Doors open too. There ain’t any fire yet too, lucky bastards.”

“Go inside n’ soak yerself in water. If yer burnt anywhere, wet a cloth and put it on. Accordin’ to Sunarin, there’s someone with rescue experience who’s on the third floor. Yer the last one there. He’s gonna save yah.”

“Oh, I’m getting a hero?” Atsumu manages to say between coughs, no longer able to hold back the fit that fought to be released. He doubled over as he entered the room. Even the fire hadn’t come here, the smoke had long since started to make residence. The white carpet has a growing tint of grey in it, flecks of ash floating through the air like discolored flecks of dust caught in the sunlight. 

“I’m going to be in the shower” Atsumu jokingly says, taking in his surroundings. His lips twists down. All personal belongings of whoever had been here are gone. So they had the time to pack and scram but not enough to bang on his door? Great. “Probably gonna have ta hang up now.”

“Tsumu-”

“Samu, Imma get rescued by a hopefully hot and strong guy.” The room is starting to spin as he walks to the bathroom, keeping his hand on the wall. He turns on the shower and puts it on the coldest setting. Even then the water is warm. “Who gets the chance? Ever read those shojos with the cute girl gettin’ rescued by the muscly firefighter? Well, that’s gonna be me.”

“Don’t ya dare try jokin’ ‘bout this, don’t” Osamu hisses. “There’s a guy riskin’ his ass to get to yers out there, and I might be listenin’ to yah both dying.”

“And that’s why Imma hang up. Yer welcome. I love yah, Samu.” And he hangs up. His heart is beating way faster than it was before and goddammit he’s scared. 

He finds only one towel- such a cheap hotel- and looks at it longingly, wanting so badly to stretch it out and cover all of his skin with it. The burn on his arm, though, it itches and burns and  _ gods  _ it hurts a lot. He takes a hopeful peek out the door to see if his saviour has arrived. His head is pounding and his breathing is a bit ragged. He sets his phone on the countertop. He ignores the call from Osamu. 

Stepping under the shower, he savors the feel of it. It soaks the towel he’s laid across the large burn on his arm, not wanting to look at the discolored skin. The water soothes his whole body and he can’t help but shiver from pleasure. It can also pass as trembling because of how much he’s trembling. 

He stays under the shower for what he thinks is a good three minutes, clothing plastered to his body, not moving an inch out of fear that his charred cloth slippers will make him slip and kill him from hitting his head rather than burning. He keeps himself busy by imagining his savior. He hopes he’s young. Osamu’s words were than Suna told him and Suna said it was a guy with experience. So an ex-firefighter? He’s not picky, but he had hopes that it would be a nice young strapping man rescuing him at what he learned was only eleven PM according to the time on his phone when Samu called the second time. 

_ Firefighter-chan better come quickly  _ he thinks as he slides down the wall. He can barely see any smoke in the bathroom, although it’s grown since he’s been in here. Maybe he should of turned the bathroom vent on. Yeah...maybe...It would of kept the smoke out. He feels so close to choking, taking in heaving breathes. Everything sort of hurts. He squeezes his eyes shut, leaning his head back against the tile. It’s not cold anymore- it’s warm. Even the water has grown hotter.  _ The pipes  _ his mind supplies  _ the water ain’t heatin’ up on its own- it’s the damned pipes.  _

“Miya-san, can you stand?” 

Atsumu’s heart thumps at the- thank gods-  _ young  _ voice. He’s going to take this man out on a date if they both make it out alive. Then his eyes open. 

_ Oh hell no _ . 

Sawamura Daichi stands there, still in his EJP Raijin uniform, as if he fell asleep in them. Atsumu hadn’t realized he had passed out but there’s a  _ lot  _ of smoke now, almost as much as there had been in his room when he woke up, the water coming out of the shower now at the temperature he would have it at after a grueling long day at practice, muscles begging for a relaxant. 

Stupid crow captain with those big cute eyes- he really does look hot.  _ Rescue experience _ . Oh right- he was an officer. Has he ran into burning buildings before? 

Sawamura steps into the shower and Atsumu realizes he never answered. Sawamura takes his team jacket draped over an arm, soaks it quickly in the water, then wraps it around Atsumu. If he were to wear it, it would probably be tight on him due to Sawamura being smaller even with his muscles, but it feels kinda nice now- and oh  _ oh  _ he’s being carried. Blood pools in his cheeks. 

“Sa-sawamura-kun” he stutters, both out of embarrassment and because he doesn’t have enough air. He notices rather bad looking burn on Sawamura’s jaw. His face is red from the heat and exertion of rescuing other people, his mouth slightly open as he pants for air. His teeth are naturally straight and unbleached white, the start of a gap at the left corner of his mouth hinting at a large gap between his teeth or a missing tooth. A few strands of short hair manage to plaster to his forehead, another burn marking itself on his neck.  _ He’s been rescuin’ people  _ his mind supplies again. Of course he’s going to get hurt. And yet, here Atsumu is, being carried like a goddamn princess when it should maybe be the other way around. 

“Stop carryin’ me, I can walk” he says. It’s thanks to his long limbs that he manages to slither out of the shorter man’s arms, hooking his arm through the other’s. “Yer hurt too- gods know how many burn you’ve got.” His eyes act on their own, quickly taking in the other man’s condition, not really being able to before he had been lifted off the ground. Burned cloth on his shoulder, a burn on his leg at the same spot as Atsumu’s, shorts charred at the right and holes near the hem of the jersey, skin flashing. 

“I’ll be fine” Sawamura says. “I’ve had worst.”

“Like what?”

“Bullet to the thigh” he says, leading Atsumu out of the bathroom. Atsumu almost immediately breaks into a series of coughs. “Lift your t-shirt to cover your mouth- it’ll keep some of the smoke out” Sawamura orders, quickly tugging Atsumu’s arm right as they exit the doorway, saving him from the fiery door-death that the corpse he had found before got. It causes him to stumble into Sawamura but the elder is quick to get them moving again. He internally cheers when two doors down Sawamura breaks into a series of coughs. They sound worst than Atsumu’s. That makes him feel guilty. 

Sawamura might of been his enemy every time he ran into him, but right now, for the first time, when both of them can suddenly die because of a conveniently places falling piece of ceiling, he rethinks the former captain. Here this man exists, for some reason, on this earth, born in the same time period as Atsumu and in the same generation. He was in his jersey still, so he had probably been out with the EJP Raijin celebrating their victory. And when he heard or saw the hotel the Jackals are staying in burning, he hadn’t just watched and waited. No, he went  _ in  _ and rescued anyone he could, regardless of who they are. And he somehow climbed the probably hellish three floors to get to him. And all Atsumu had done since he learned about the man was spite him out of jealousy. 

Atsumu pulls his t-shirt up to cover his mouth. Even with his whole body being soaked, he can feel the water drying already. He carefully keeps the towel balanced on his left arm. If another block of whatever decides that it wants to try and cudgel him or Sawamura, he’d going to be ready. 

They make it to the stairwell with relatively little trouble. Sawamura somehow knows where to step, tugging at Atsumu to keep him from tripping or getting showered by a bursting lightbulb or a shower of ash. 

The doorway is conveniently open-  _ Sawamura  _ his smoke-filled mind coughs at him- and now Atsumu takes initiative. Instead of having his sleeve dripped by Sawamura, he clamps his right hand around the opposite hitter’s bicep. His fingers probably only make it a little over halfway around. Any other situation he’d probably make a flirty joke. If Sawamura, for some reason had been the one gripping his arm in a normal situation, he probably would of insulted everything about the man, ranging from his ordinary hair and ordinary playing style and ordinary big brown eyes- okay, he doesn’t know  _ what  _ is up with those eyes, but they just- dammit, focus on the situation at hand, ‘Tsumu. 

A brush of his fingers against the railing confirms that it’s heartened up. The fire hasn’t reached up here but a look below blesses his eyes with a sea of flickering red and orange. He takes the towel off his arm, wrapping his hand in it before gripping the rail. 

“I can walk on my own” Sawamura says. 

“You can walk, but ya can also fall” Atsumu retorts. “I ain’t gonna’ have ya die on me after fainting from gods know how much smoke inhalation. And Sunarin and Hinata would be pretty mad at me for killin’ ya off.” He leads them down the stairs, the heat starting to grow even more.

“I don’t think Hinata would be that angry” Sawamura rasps. “Sad, yes, but I can count the times I’ve seen him angry on one hand.” Atsumu sends him a worried glance. 

“Haven’t ya heard of takin’ it easy? I don’t think you should be talking.”

“I”ll be fine. We’re only a few minutes away from the ambulance.”

“Why hasn’t the fire department come yet!?” Atsumu exclaims. 

“Traffic and the fire started from the gas station next door blowing up” Sawamura manages to answer before breaking into a fit of coughs. Atsumu’s grip tightens on the man’s bicep. He breathes a sigh of relief when they make it to floor two. He kicks the open door, which greets them with hellish sight of what can basically be called an ingerono close so no stray fireballs start shooting at them before leading them to the last flight of stairs. He swallows. It’s so much hotter now. His skin feels like it’s blistering and he’s not even at the fire yet!

“How did you make it up here” Atsumu thinks out loud. 

“You run” Sawamura answers. “Also, the bottom is tile. Stay away from the walls and you won’t get burned. The lobby is the worst.” Atsumu nods. After this, he can basically consider himself a certified fireman. 

They finally make it onto the first floor. There’s a dead body spread across the ground, body burning, a pool of blood around them, limbs twisted wrongly.  _ They must of caught fire and then thrown themself  _ Atsumu thinks.  _ Dead body number two _ . 

“Come on” Sawamura says. Atsumu hadn’t realized he’d been staring at the body for that long. “Or else you’ll end up like him.” Atumu nods, shaking himself out of the trance. The walk to the open lobby door and Atsumu is greeted by fire eagerly reaching out to him.

“Oh hell no” he cries. “What is this!? Mura-kun, I apologize, but there is  _ no way _ -” he pauses when he sees Sawamura pry his fingers off his bicep before walking behind the open door, taking off his jersey.

There’s more muscle underneath...NO! You are  _ both  _ going to burn to death. Stop it. Remember? Enemy But also saviour). Atsumu adjusts the jacket around his shoulders. The water he had soaked himself with it is just about all gone, clothing gone stiff and towel having dried and stiffened in the shape of his hand. 

“There’s a water fountain” Sawamura says before breaking into a horrible coughing fit. Atsumu rushes over, patting the guy on the back, not knowing what else to do, even though he’s pretty sure it won’t help out with smoke inhalation. “S-soak your clothes and yourself. I-It’ll help.” And then Sawamura falls to the floor, eyelids closed but eyes still fluttering behind them. 

“Hey- Sawamura!” Atsumu just fast enough to keep the man from bonking his head on the ground. “Mura-kun, ya can’t just faint on me like that! Yer supposed to be my hot firefighter rescueman!” Sawamura doesn’t answer except for a series of coughs that wouldn’t stop. The sound gets Atsumu going. He coughs into his elbow out of instinct, eyes darting over the man and then the water fountain. Atsumu worriedly looks at the fire and then down at Sawamura. He retrieves the soaked jersey and manages to put it on Sawamura. Then he soaks the jacket, happy that the water isn’t that hot, only a bit warm. He also curses the water fountain for being too slow. He sits Sawamura up and puts the jacket on him before soaking the towel and draping it over the unconscious man’s head. He’s probably overheated and choking on the stuff in his lungs. 

He’s so going to regret this later. 

Atsumu takes off his own t-shirt, soaking it and wringing it out to also get Sawamura’s lower body as wet as he could. Releivingly, his imagination doesn’t take flight. Then he picks Sawamura up kind of the same way Sawamura had tried to carry him, angeling him so that his head rests on Atsumu’s shoulder, weak coughs still continuing to wrack through the man’s body. He makes sure that the towel is balanced, making sure that the man fits in the space of Atsumu’s body and doesn’t have limbs sticking out and being a fire hazard (haha- how not funny). Then he looks at the inferno, makes sure that his arms are properly wrapped around Sawamura: an arm below the thigh with his hand resting on bare skin to try and protect it, other hand across the back of his head to keep the towel in place and as an extra layer of protection. 

“How did he make it? Running. Okay. Alright. I got this” Atsumu says to himself, hunching over a little bit and taking in a large breath of air. Right when his lungs fill with smoke flavored oxygen goodness, he runs through the roaring fire. 

Gods, it’s  _ hot _ . 

He doesn’t know left or right anymore (at least he knows up to down). His ears seek out the sounds of sirens. The fire chases after him, forcing him to ditch his slippers when they decide to catch on fire.  _ All the hotels I’m stayin’ in from now on are gonna have a tiled lobby.  _ He shoulder rams into a falling decorative wooden support beam, twisting to keep Sawamura from getting hit, ignoring the urge to drop the man in favor of trying to pat out the fire that has taken residence on his left shoulder (at least it’s the left one). 

“HEY! I SEE SOMEONE! MIYA-SAN, I SEE SOMEONE!” He hears a familiar too-young-for-his-age sounding voice. Atsumu hurries, lungs finally running out of air, forcing him to breathe in even smokier air. He feels bad for Sawamura though- the thought of the opposite hitter gets him running even faster, keeping his feet off the ground long enough to not really burn but not really stay untouched. 

_ Regular air is too cold  _ is one of the first thoughts that hit him upon stepping past broken glass and through a window after cutting his feet on the shards. He keeps his arms wrapped around Sawamura but allows himself to break into couches. He feels someone take the unconscious man out of his grip and he’s pushed onto something that’s flat and barely soft. Something is put over his mouth and suddenly he can kind of breathe. If only he’d stop coughing...he suddenly feels like he’s moving and when he opens his eyes, everything seems sort of blurry. A hand holds his and he turns his head, making out a head of dark brown and eyes identical to his own. 

“Samu” he manages to rest. 

“You’re gonna be alright, ya got it, you brat?” Samu is saying. “Yer gonna’ make it.” Atsumu lets out a small chuckle.

“ ‘Course I am.” A few meters behind Osamu, a single part of the background becomes clear to him: a body on a stretcher being quickly loaded in, a flash of orange hair that can’t be anyone other than Hinata follow after. Sawamura’s face is streaked with black soot, burns littered over his body of various sizes. 

But he’s still coughing. He’s alive. 

Atsumu doesn’t know why he feels so relieved at this and his eyes flutter shut. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daichi POV

“He what?” Sawamura Daichi blinks, looking at the Miya twin which he is glad to call a friend thanks to the few times they’ve chatted when Osamu had come to the EJP Raijin’s practices to meet with Suna, his coming also being joined with a large amount of onigiri. He had recognized the man from his high school days when they played each other on the national court, but also because he looks so similar to his twin who Sawamura had seen a few times when watching the MSBY Black Jackals matches when he still worked as an officer. 

From all the stories he had heard of Atsumu before all of this, he had thought he would have thought that he’d dislike the man. But then again, he had thought the same about Oikawa Tooru yet he has become good friends with the man after meeting up with him in Argentina. 

Leaving the police...it had been one of the best and worst things he’d ever done. It was a few months after he’d gotten shot, at the age of twenty-one after a year on the force and a two year undergraduate degree in criminal justice. There was just something...missing, about it. Miyagi was too quiet and when he finally got a taste of real action, it led to a week in a hospital bed and a few more of physical therapy.

And everything had seemed like it had been piling up. His anxiety and stress levels rose. He found himself worrying over reports due in a week and nearly pulling his hair out when the realization of just how much he had left to do crashed on him. So after resigning, betting an honorable discharge, he packed all the things in his small apartment and rented out a storage locker for a year to keep it in, wrote a letter and put it in his childhood home’s mailbox along with his phone, put his apartment on the market, and bought a ticket to the first flight that would take him out of the country and continent:

Argentina. 

The first two months in San Juan, Argentina were nice and were filled with a different type of stress. He’d always been good at languages, picking up English very quickly, understanding half of the words in his mom’s korean soaps after a few months. Spanish, with it’s similar structure and vocabulary to english, was a challenge to learn but it was nice. 

He got a job at an asian restaurant run by a Japanese man born and raised in Argentina who pitied Daichi after he told him his story. The man helped Daichi improve and polish his Spanish, buying him the uniform required of a waiter in a restaurant on the higher end of the culinary spectrum. The food was both homely and foreign: it had the characteristics of Japanese cuisine but there were Argentinian and other local twists on the food he could find only minutes away no matter where he was in Japan. But he has to admit: chocolate in curry is unique but not bad. 

He soon became a favorite amongst regular customers and the other workers. His accented Japanese made the locals smile and the Japanese immigrants cherished there being someone from their homeland. It became second nature to hop from Japanese to Spanish. There were some Japanese kids and teens who felt confident in their home-taught Japanese with Spanish words thrown in every other words, messing up the grammar structure and making comprehension a puzzle, but it was endearing how they tried to make him feel more comfortable. And for the workers...well...apparently he has a baby face. And he’s also the youngest one in the restaurant. And that comes with a slew of embarrassing terms of endearment as well as being spoiled rotten by the older workers. 

It in the middle those two months when he started hearing the whispers of a foreigner joining the local professional volleyball team. Daichi would occasionally go to the beach and play beach volleyball, but other than that, there was still an empty feeling inside of him. Even though he’s managed to save enough money to move out of the motel and into a barely furbished dingy apartment which feels more like home with its rusty pipes and decaying couch than the nice apartment he had in Japan, he feels like there’s still something left to be filled. Even though he had gone to an internet cafe and finally checked and replied to his hundred-plus emails. Even with all of that, the depression that had formed a week before him getting shot is still there.

“Hey, chiquitito!” The restaurant owner calls. Daichi knows it’s him because it’s only him who is called nicknames like that by the restaurant’s crew. He looks up from where he’s loading up a tray of mojitos that he just finished mixing. “There’s a large party at table fourteen. After taking care of the drinks, go ahead and serve them, alright? You’ll earn a pretty nice tip.” Daichi nods. 

“Alright. Thank you, tío.”

After serving the mojitos, he wipes his hands off, straightens his black vest and the tie under it and heads for table fourteen, pulling out a pen and notepad, reminding himself to write in spanish rather than japanese. 

“Hello!” He greets in Spanish. “My name is Daichi Sawamura, and I will be your server today. May I get you guys something to drink?” And it’s only after he finishes these words does he see what these men are dressed in: jerseys. Specifically, volleyball jersey. The Club de San Juan jerseys. He hears a small gasp. 

“Sawamura Daichi!?” He hears a vaguely familiar voice say. Familiar as in he knows that voice. Vague as in he’s tried to bury all memories he has of the annoying thing. Gods, it sounds exactly the same. But at the moment, he’s shocked and slowly becoming happy. There’s someone he knows here. 

“Oh, Toquite” one of the players say. “You know this guy?What, did you manage to pull him into bed with you?” Daichi watches, amused, as Oikawa’s face contorts, obviously trying to mentally translate the words before his eyes widen. 

“Andre!” He exclaims indignantly. “No no no. So, Dai-chan, how have you been?” He says in Japanese. 

“Good” he shrugs, replying in Spanish. “Stop trying to weasel your way out of tough situations- it’s not my fault you’re bad at Spanish.” The rest of Oikawa’s team laughs. The setter pouts. 

“Since when have you worked here?” Oikawa asks. “I was literally here a few months ago and I never saw you.”

“I moved here two months ago.” Daichi says. “I wanted a change of scenery so I randomly chose Argentina. It’s not my fault I happened to run into you.”

“So who exactly are you?” One of the players ask, his jersey reading the number eight. 

“He’s Sawamura Daichi!” Oikawa squeaks. “Don’t you remember the stories I told you about that annoying crow team that beating us and then they even beat Shiratorizawa?”

“Oh? He was on the team that beat Ushijuan?” Another man asks. 

“Yeah! And even worse…” Oikawa adds a pause for dramatic effect. “He was their captain.”

The team, much to Oikawa’s annoyance probably, congratulated Daichi on his past victories. He chats a little bit more with them before taking their orders. They stay for three hours and when he comes back to clean the table, he sees that Oikawa is still there along with a quite large tip pile. 

“So, sit down!” Oikawa says in Japanese. “I didn’t mean to be so rude back there, haha” he rubs the back of his neck. Daichi just stands there, not sitting. “I was just surprised there’s someone I know here. Did you know I ran into your little chibi-chan some time back?” 

“Yeah, he sent me photos. Are you going to buy anything else?”

“No no no. I just...want to catch up.” Daichi raises his left arm, checking the time. 

“My shift ends in half an hour and my last table is almost on desert. Do you want me to get you something? We have some milkbread, since some of our workers are addicted to the stuff and I think I remember reading you like it?”

Oikawa leans forward, eyes gleaming. He’s tanner than he was in Japan. Taller, even, much to Daichi’s annoyance. “Like it? No no no- I love it.”

After his shift ends, he and Oikawa go to the beach, chatting along the way. Daichi tells him why he’s here. From his bland career as an officer, to gradually forming depression he hadn’t identified back then, getting shot, the hospital, the growing stress and anxiety and depression and everything just becoming too much. Leaving everything and going to Argentina because it was the soonest leaving international flight. Oikawa whistles at the end of the story. The two of them stand in the water, waves lapping at their feet before receding and then coming back again. He’ll never dislike the feeling of the sand slipping from his feet, making it feel like he’s moving without really moving. 

“I always thought you would do something with volleyball- I don’t mean to be so stereotypical, Dai-chan, but most captains are really dedicated.” Daichi nods. 

“I haven’t had much time though. I think I considered it, but with being an officer, I didn’t really have the time to join the Sendai Frogs or anything” he sees Oikawa’s face wrinkle “Hey, they’re getting good! Tsukishima joined them and I’m pretty sure so did one of your kouhai. Kyoutani, was it?” 

“You’ve got a point there.” 

The two of them continue looking at the horizon. There’s two boats in the distant, kids swimming, adults floating on their backs, people using flat boards to kind-of ride the waves. 

“Why don’t you play volleyball?” Oikawa asks. “I mean, like, my team will probably be willing to let you practice with us. We do this weekly thing were we play high schools and colleges so it’ll be fine if you come with us. Then because we’re so much better than any team Japan has got, you can be super good by the time you go back!” Daichi feels there’s a message hidden in there.

“And?”

“...only our libero is good at defense. I hate to say this, but we all suck at it in comparison to the other teams. It’s given the other team a lot of easy points.”

“You’re telling me to join your team, not practice.”

“No no! Just, like” Oikawa flaps his hands around “Show us how to. Teach us. Think of it as a volunteer coaching position!”

And that’s what Daichi does. Five days a week he joins Club de San Juan, travelling with them for some of their games so he can give advise when they’re in a crunch and so that he can observe what happens in a professional match. When he returns to Japan, he’s thinner because of sometimes having to skip meals because of money issues and not having the time, and also because of the amount of exercise he’s done. He has a nice tan and also has stronger muscles. He’s more agile, has more stamina. He comes back to Japan not just with a large Spanish vocabulary, alcoholic drink mixes in his mind, and new recipes running through his brain but also a large repertoire of volleyball knowledge and better read blocking skill than he had before. 

He also formed a unique friendship with one Oikawa Tooru. He makes sure to text him at least once a week with a complimentary annoying message to take care of his knee. 

He got more than a few wacks upside the head for being almost completely radio silent. He also got a few dozen hugs because even though Argentina helped, he still got a few depressive episodes (and Oikawa got Koushi’s number from Hinata and the setter knew somehow that Daichi wouldn’t of willingly told his friends what’s going on in his brain so he told his best friend for him and said silver-haired traitorous best friend told basically everyone he knows….but that helped).

Then he made it onto the EJP Raijin. It was amazing. His level of skill had been mediocre when he started in Argentina but then it grew. He learned serves. He learned new exercises. He learned better hits and blocks. So when he went to tryouts, he was more than shocked at how the other players trying out played like. “Amateurs- pathetic” the Oikawa in his head remarks. 

And then he was on the court. It was his fourth game of his professional career, this time against the MSBY Black Jackals. He had met up with Hinata and Bokuto for breakfast- it was good to catch up with them- and then he had returned to the court to warm-up and practice before the game, reading up and watching videos on the players just like he did in high school. 

Miya Atsumu. He remembers that face. He remembers the knowledge he had shoved into his brain in high school. Watch out. When they’d lined up on the court, he kept his focus on Hinata, smiling comfortingly at his former underclassman. Even though the boy no longer outwardly seems nervous, he can tell that the boy is more than excited to face him. He’d also kept his attention on Hinata because he did not want to look at Miya, whose glare he could feel even without looking. What’s up with him? And then even in the match, it seemed as if Miya was giving him extra attention, making his monstrous dual jump serves aimed for him, setting the ball to whoever was close to him, especially if it was Sakusa with his razor sharp spin on the ball. 

Then Daichi and his team...they’d won. They had won against the team with the other type of monster generation. Daichi’s team was made up of people who were awesome at defense; the Jackals were the same, except with offense. It reminded him of their game against Nekoma in nationals: offense versus defense, instinct versus intuition. 

And then walking around Hiroshima with his hands in his pockets before heading home to sleep and then see Hinata and Bokuto off in the morning, he heard a boom in the distance. His police training had kicked in and by the time he got there three minutes later, following the smoke that was visible even in the night sky, the hotel which he recognizes because he had dropped Hinata and Bokuto off there was on fire, the first and second floors already burning almost as brightly as the small building next to them. He had sniffed the air- gasoline. The gas station, that was the small building, had blown up. 

As Koushi had always said, Daichi liked to play hero. It wasn’t that he liked it- it’s just that if he can help, he will. 

He got Hinata out. He got another player from the Jackals out. He helped the hotel workers that were still in there get out. He freed trapped people, pulled burning people out from under fallen pieces of wood, covered the eyes of children so they wouldn’t have to see their parents dead bodies. 

Then it turns out Miya Atsumu, the persistent artificial blond with the smirk that didn’t actually look threatening, was trapped on the third floor. So Daichi had went, since the always (before this) calm and collected and never really that expressive Osamu seemed to be on the verge of breaking down and Suna wasn’t able to do anything to help. 

He got to Miya. He helped Miya get out. Sometime along the way their positions had switched and he had...passed out, he thinks, when they reached the lobby. 

He didn’t know what happened next. 

When he woke up in the hospital, Suna and Hinata were fast asleep on the chairs in the room. He managed to wake Hinata up, which led to a nurse, which led to more confusion and the knowledge he’d been passed out for four days. Then Osamu came in, looking like death, and told him what happened. 

Atsumu had rescued him. And even though Daichi had been in worse condition first, Atsumu had ended up getting the lash back of all the good-luck Daichi had to pull on the save as many people as he did. He was still unconscious, numerous burns on his body, an especially bad one on his shoulder since when he came out with Daichi it had been on fire. 

Most of Daichi’s recovery happened when he was unconscious. It was only two more days of observation, a prescription to finish patching his throat and lungs up, and a pretty pricey salve to keep the burns from scarring. 

His discharge led from him moving from one hospital room to another. 

Atsumu looks...still. He isn’t small by any means and takes up almost all of the hospital bed. If the blanket covered more, he would of looked asleep. Except his arms are on top of the blanket, loose soft cotton gauze and bandages wrapped around his left forearm, shoulder, and probably more. He’s off the oxygen at least. 

“They say he’ll wake up any moment now” Osamu says. “Do you know what he told me on the phone?” The man lets out a small laugh. “Well, he said he was gonna get rescued by a hot and strong guy who’d make him the protagonist of a shojo.” Daichi can’t help but laugh at this. 

“I mean” he muses, looking down with a pang of sadness at the too-still man who had seemed energetic and confident on the court. Those hands which could set just as, if not better, than Kageyama. Legs that cold land with precision and flexible arms that move to get at an angle which would give the hitter the best ball possible. “I’ve never really tried romance before. I never...had the time.”

Osamu looks at him. Dumbfounded. “Yer kiddin’ me” he says, accent coming out stronger than ever. “Sawamura, yer a nice lookin’ guy and you really are really nice. Out of all the people in the world-”

“Come to think of it, you’re brother was a pretty good conversationalist on the way” Daichi says, pretending to be thinking. “And he did save me from a fire.” 

“Yer both dumbasses. I take back every nice thing I said about ya.” Osamu deadpans. And then his face twists with interest. “But, yer my friend. And ‘Tsumu’s my brother. I care for both of ya and there’s so much not in common between you two, I don’t want it to end-”

“In heartbreak? It’s going to be one date I plan on going with him, Osamu. And even then, I don’t think he’ll really know what it is. It’s not like he’ll take an invitation out to lunch as a date.” 

Osamu shakes his head. “Still.”

“Still, I am willing to give your brother a chance if he wants it. It’s not like I feel love or anything for him- I don’t even have a crush yet!” Daichi remarks. “And plus- I think maybe he went and made me the protagonist of a shojo. He is hot.” The twin is quick to slap his hands over his eyes. 

“Ew, gross- I did not just hear ya say my brother his hot.”

“What? Isn’t it the same as saying you’re hot?” Daichi innocently starts. 

“Yer not my friend anymore.”

“That’s like the fifth time you’ve ever said that.”


	3. Chapter 3

Atsumu wants to wonder why Sawamura suddenly becomes friends with him. But then again, they did sort of rescue each other. Sawamura is a really nice guy, he learns while he’s still trapped in the hospital. He gets along with just about anyone and not because he’s a people-pleaser or because he’s being fake: he’s just naturally that way. He seems like the honest guy you’d be neighbors with, who would get your cat out of a tree, but he isn’t simple. He’s a lot more complicated than that. 

The man’s also good at talking. He weaves stories like nobody’s business, telling him funny tales from his high school days, practices with the Raijin, how chaotic Hinata used to be. He tells him about the far-off land of Argentina, his unlikely friendship with that stupid setter Oikawa, his mentality and fear of  _ not being enough  _ which resonates with Atsumu’s own heart. 

Atsumu is never alone in the hotel room. His teammates (Sakusa even!), Osamu, Sunarin, Sawamura. Therapy is horrible but his brother is with him all throughout it. During visiting hours, Sawamura spoils him with homemade food and sweets with combinations of ingredients he’s never tasted before. 

“ _ What’s in this curry?” _

_ “Chocolate.” _

_ “BLEH- wait a moment...it’s actually good… _ ”

And when he was finally discharged, he found himself not wanting to leave Hiroshima. Meian and Foster told him that they’re staying for another three days before they have to get ready for their next game in a month. The reminder makes Atsumu remember the fire again. The burns on his body have healed and faded really nicely thanks to whatever the doctors have given him. Sawamura has a few burns that look like they might lightly scar, especially the one on his jaw. 

_ “Say- is that a missing tooth? Did yer teeth never grow back in?” _

_ “Ah, no. It was the preliminaries for Nationals, the one I beat you in.” _

_ “Mean.” _

_ “Anyway, it was a collision with Tanaka- he was our ace in your third year- but it knocked my tooth out and gave me a pretty nasty bruise.” _

And then lunch. Day one. Day two. On day three, the day they leave, he asks the question. He knows that he shouldn’t be so straightforward and assumptive, but he needs to know! He’s going to be in Osaka by tonight. There’s going to be hundred of kilometers between them!

“Hey Daichi?” He asked, for once going with the man’s insistence of calling him by his first name since Atsumu insists upon the same. “Are we...correct me if I’m wrong, but are we dating?” Daichi’s chopsticks freeze in his miso soup. The man looks up and his large eyes look so soft, just like hot chocolate on a cold winter’s day.  _ Why am I doing this _ ? He thinks. Daichi looks like the guy who’s probably straight. Got a lot of confessions and one or two steady girlfriends before he marries a nice woman, has two children and a dog, grows old, doesn’t really argue…

Except Daichi has proven a lot of that wrong. 

He likes dogs, yeah, but he’s allergic so he can’t stay around them for long. He has argued with Atusumu about a thing or two when in the hospital. And he remembers their disagreements on the Day, when Daichi had tried carrying Atsumu out of the burning hotel room. Daichi never got an excessive amount of confessions- he’s gotten all of two: one during valentine’s day of his first year of high school, and another by his close friend Michimiya Yui who plays on the national foot volleyball team or whatever (they’re still friends). He also learned that he’s also never had a girlfriend, rejecting both of them. 

Daichi never answered why. Until now. 

“I-I mean, if yer straight and I never had a chance-” he begins to ramble. Daichi laughs, leaning forward across the top of the table. 

“Atsumu” he says and there’s something with the way he says his name, especially the  _ tsu _ , that melts Atsumu’s insides. “You know all about my romantic life- there’s a  _ reason  _ that for the three weeks we’ve known each other I told you that. I’m as straight as a volleyball.” Atsumu blinks at him. _ What _ ? Daichi sights. “I mean, I’m gay. And, as for the dating part…” Daichi blushes and looks away, back down at his miso. He fiddles the chopsticks. 

And Atsumu? He’s smiling. 

“You stupid baby cow crow captain” Atsumu says while shaking his head, smile spreading wider and wider. “You’re my night in shining armor.” Daichi looks up with a small  _ huh _ ? Atsumu folds his hands under his chin. “Is that what you’ve been doing all along, Mura-kun? Have you been trying to make me” he bats his eyelashes, twisting his head “ _ fall  _ for you?” Daichi’s cheeks burn brighter and Atsumu laughs. 

“Sh-shut up” the older man mutters but a shy smile starts to spread across his face.  _ Aw _ . “But, uh...you could say it was me you fell for you along the way.”

“Nice” Atsumu says, leaning back in his seat. “Just like a shojo. I love it. We’d have ta settle for a long distance relationship, but Suna and Samu are doin’ fine. I say we give it a try.”

“Oho- are you asking me out?” Daichi asks. 

“Stop acting so coy” Atsumu says. “Of course I’m askin’ yah out! Have you looked at yourself? You’re...amazing.”

“And so are you.”

The next time the MSBY Black Jackals and the EJP Raijin meet on the court, Daichi keeps his eyes on Atsumu and Atsumu smiles at him. And even though the Raijin loose that time, allowing the Jackals to face of against the Schweiden Adlers, it’s only smiles that are traded after the game, not tears. 

**Author's Note:**

> Joiiiiiiiiiiiin meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee in AtsuDai hell
> 
> I find that I've actually grown quite fond of this pairing- enough to read all AO3 has to offer in regards to AtsuDai. So how did y'all like it? Any grammatical errors made in the two hours it took me to binge-write? Any edits? Maybe *looks around* a sequel, or another rarepair fic/whump fic? I think I might make another AtsuDai fic...probably...yeah...you know what? I should just dedicate a series to rarpairs. That sounds good.


End file.
